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\u201cAnthrotheist\u201d<\/a> commented in the combox<\/a> of my post,\u00a0Dialogue w Atheist on the Origin of the Universe<\/a>. His words will be in blue<\/span>.<\/p>\n *****<\/p>\n I can\u2019t help but feel like there is still a \u201cGod of the gaps\u201d in effect here.<\/span><\/p>\n Of course. I think it\u2019s because that is the stock response of lots of atheists, whenever we dare bring up God at all. Since you guys think He is nonexistent and belief in Him the equivalent of belief in leprechauns and Santa Claus, if we mention Him there has to be some way to dismiss<\/em> it altogether, and that is usually good ol\u2019 \u201cGod of the gaps.\u201d You don\u2019t acknowledge that belief in God can explain anything<\/em>.<\/p>\n Because theism is not a scientific explanation, you assume it is somehow \u201canti-science\u201d: thus, the knee-jerk \u201cGod of the gaps\u201d objection, which basically is intended to shut down further discussion, since the theist is wrongly thought to be relying on mere silliness and an anti-scientific attitude (which in turn precludes serious discussion, for the materialistic, science-only-sort of person). But honing in on the limitations<\/em> of science is not anti-science at all.<\/p>\n We could just as easily say that you guys simply substitute the goddess of Time (give it enough time and anything whatever can occur) or\u00a0 the atom-gods: which possess all the remarkable creative and organizational abilities that we ascribe to God, and for no more discernible scientifically established reason than we can attribute to God. I don\u2019t see all that much difference, in an epistemological sense. Both sides must appeal (for lack of any better idea) to notions that are outside of the scientific purview. And that\u2019s okay, and fully to be expected, because science is not the entire sum of human knowledge in the first place.<\/p>\n And in that context of equally nonexistent answers and reasons (from a strictly scientific, empirical\u00a0 perspective), we think God is more plausible as the candidate for having godlike qualities than the atom (or, sub-atomic particles, as it were). That\u2019s not merely \u201cgod of the gaps\u201d; rather, it is part and parcel of the serious, respectable philosophical worldview of theism.<\/p>\n It is true that there is no current scientific theory that explains either how life can originate from non-life, or how life did originate from non-life.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n I don\u2019t see why there cannot be an understood \u201cyet\u201d at the end of this statement. <\/span><\/p>\n There could<\/em> be, but the problem is that it seems to be an indefinite<\/em> \u201cyet.\u201d Oftentimes, this mindset is of the danging a carrot: always there, but inevitably out of reach. I often think of scientists, say, 50 years ago, in 1968 and a scenario in which they were asked, \u201cdo you think that, 50 years from now, we will have a plausible explanation of a materialistic evolution of life from non-life, and\/or proof of extraterrestrial life?\u201d I would venture to guess that some 90% of them would say that one or both of those things would surely have occurred by now. It\u2019s obvious in scientific rhetoric that the explanation or discovery is often widely assumed to be just around the corner.<\/p>\n So it\u00a0 becomes a technique itself (and not a particularly impressive one). They casually assume that science can, or one day will, be able to explain anything whatever<\/em> (which is a very questionable assumption), because they think matter and time and chance \/ probability can explain anything (making those three things gods), and because they rule out any possible theistic explanation or the possibility that maybe God didn\u2019t want<\/em> life anywhere but on earth: that life and human beings indeed are unique in the universe.<\/p>\n On the other hand, if such life is discovered, it doesn\u2019t disprove God in the slightest (even though many will say that it does, just as they have fallaciously done with evolution for over 150 years. Christians like C. S. Lewis have already written about this possibility (as I have myself). Life somewhere else doesn\u2019t \u201cprove\u201d that it could come about through solely materialistic processes, anymore than life on earth has proven that. Scientists don\u2019t have the slightest clue how it supposedly happened. But they will!, they will<\/em>!, they will<\/em><\/strong>! ad infinitum<\/em> . . .<\/p>\n We didn\u2019t have a scientific theory of most diseases before germ theory, nor any scientific explanation for the diversity of life before the theory of evolution.<\/span><\/p>\n The problem is not simply admitting that we don\u2019t know something (scientifically). The problem is that God can never<\/em> be proposed as the explanation for anything<\/em>. I agree that Christians have been quick to credit God with what was merely natural; but atheists have also been quick to deny that God could do anything. I find both things equally closed-minded and unreasonable.<\/p>\n This to me is the larger point: looking at a difficult question, one that seems insurmountable, and saying \u201cGod did it\u201d doesn\u2019t get you anywhere.<\/span><\/p>\n It doesn\u2019t scientifically, because that\u2019s not scientific method. But it can go quite a ways in philosophy and theology: which don\u2019t have the pretense of claiming that their own field of knowledge is the only one that exists.<\/p>\n At best, it pushes the quest for knowledge to the fringes of society to be conducted in secluded and cloistered institutions in relative obscurity (and only indirectly funded by organizations with resources to spare); <\/span><\/p>\n If that\u2019s what you call philosophy and theology (mathematics and logic are not empirical, either) . . . I don\u2019t. I think they are fields just as valuable and productive and worthy of respect as science. And once again you simply exhibit your extreme bias and prejudice against non-scientific (not un<\/em>scientific or anti<\/em>-scientific! )thinking.<\/p>\n at worst, it produces an attempt at an epistemology derived from forgone conclusions like \u201cIntelligent Design\u201d (i.e., re-branded Creationism).<\/span><\/p>\n Intelligent design is not necessarily creationism. Richard Dawkins stated in his book that microbiologist Michael Behe was a creationist. He\u2019s not. He is a theistic evolutionist, as he has clearly stated. But he thinks that materialistic processes cannot adequately explain the complexity of even microbiology alone. He thinks a Designer is required. So do I. And so have great philosophical minds like David Hume (who was not<\/em> an atheist<\/a>, and believed in a form of the teleological argument). Einstein was not a theist, but he thought it self-evident that there was a wonder and beauty and (if you will) design to the universe that atheism couldn\u2019t come close to explaining. He didn\u2019t try to explain it by science alone, because he knew that was foolish. And this sense was what he called his own \u201creligion.\u201d<\/p>\n You want to talk about \u201cforegone conclusions\u201d<\/span>? I have already noted some of your own<\/em>:<\/p>\n 1) Life must<\/em><\/strong> have evolved from non-life, by materialistic processes.<\/p>\n 2) The universe must<\/em><\/strong> have come about by purely materialistic processes, based on the potentialities of matter, which originated who knows how?<\/p>\n 3) God and His attributes couldn\u2019t possibly<\/em><\/strong> have been the explanation of either of those origins.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n We have our beliefs (and reasons for them): \u201cGod did it.\u201d You have yours (and no<\/em>\u00a0good or plausible reasons for them, that I can see): \u201cGod could not possibly<\/em> have done it.\u201d I don\u2019t see a helluva lot of difference between the two belief-system in this regard. We both accept axioms that have not been demonstrated and quite likely could not<\/em> be explained or will not ever in fac<\/em>t be fully<\/em> explained.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve been contemplating a thought experiment for a little while now, maybe a charitable reader of these conversations could provide some feedback. <\/span><\/p>\n I will do so (at least partially) myself!<\/p>\n The premise is simple enough: to the degree which it is possible, describe what you would expect a universe to look like if you accept the assumption that the opposite to your belief were true. If you believe in God, imagine a purely material universe; <\/span><\/p>\n I think it would be chaotic and that the laws of science would not be what we now observe, because they never would have evolved. Life wouldn\u2019t have evolved because there seems to be no way (by our present knowledge) for it to do so. It\u2019s simply too wonderful and complex to be explained solely by matter, time, and chance. Or, perhaps more likely (since we still have to explain the origin of mater itself), there would be nothing at all.<\/p>\n if you believe in no god, imagine a universe created by God. <\/span><\/p>\n I look forward to seeing what atheists say to that. It could be quite entertaining. If they said, \u201cit would look like the world we live in now\u201d then they would have to immediately become a theist. :-)<\/p>\n If possible, accept that there are human beings in the imagined world; that is, by some means human beings have managed to come into existence and survived to the point where this conversation is taking place. How similar could the universe be to your understanding of our actual world and what would have to be different? <\/span><\/p>\n I think in that world, the human beings would have no final purpose or meaning to life; no ethics. It would be a terrible world, much like the \u201cworlds\u201d we see in societies that tried to reject Christianity and\/or God altogether (Stalin\u2019s Soviet Union, Mao\u2019s China; Hitler\u2019s Germany). I think the good things ultimately derive from a good God, whether folks are aware of it or not.<\/p>\n What would have to be true for it to exist opposite to your beliefs, and what would have to be true for us to exist here as we sit?<\/span><\/p>\n That\u2019s the far more interesting question. I would have to be shown that 1) the world can possibly be explained solely through materialistic processes, and 2) that all the arguments for God clearly fail, and 3) that Jesus didn\u2019t exist and the Bible was just a sham.<\/p>\n Since none of those things have remotely<\/em> been done, I don\u2019t think I\u2019m in any danger of forsaking Christianity or God anytime soon.<\/p>\n I shall end with Christian philosopher Alvin Plantinga\u2019s observation that \u201cGod-of-the-gaps theology\u201d is not a thing which many serious, thinking Christians would ever adopt in the first place<\/em> (i.e., it\u2019s a caricature of what Christians believe, and so a straw man):<\/p>\n God-of-the-gaps theology. . . is at best a kind of anemic and watered-down semideism that inserts God\u2019s activity into the gaps in scientific knowledge; it is associated, furthermore, with a weak and pallid apologetics according to which perhaps the main source or motivation for belief in God is that there are some things science cannot presently explain. A far cry indeed from what the Scriptures teach! God-of-the-gaps theology is worlds apart from serious Christian theism. This is evident at (at least) the following points. First and most important, according to serious theism, God is constantly, immediately, intimately, and directly active in his creation: he constantly upholds it in existence and providentially governs it. He is immediately and directly active in everything from the Big Bang to the sparrow\u2019s fall. Literally nothing happens without his upholding hand.<\/p>\n Second, natural laws are not in any way independent of God, and are perhaps best thought of as regularities in the ways in which he treats the stuff he has made, or perhaps as counterfactuals of divine freedom. (Hence there is nothing in the least untoward in the thought that on some occasions God might do something in a way different from his usual way- e.g., raise someone from the dead or change water into wine.) Indeed, the whole\u00a0interventionist\u00a0<\/em>terminology- speaking of God as\u00a0intervening<\/em>\u00a0in nature, or\u00a0intruding<\/em>\u00a0into it, or\u00a0interfering\u00a0<\/em>with it, or\u00a0violating<\/em>\u00a0natural law- all this goes with God-of-the-gaps theology, not with serious theism. According to the latter, God is already and always intimately acting in nature, which depends from moment to moment for its existence upon immediate divine activity; there is not and could not be any such thing as his intervening in nature.<\/p>\n These are broadly speaking metaphysical differences between Christian theism and God-of-the-gaps thought; but there are equally significant epistemological differences. First, the thought that there is such a person as God is not, according to Christian theism, a hypothesis postulated to\u00a0explain<\/em>\u00a0something or other, nor is the main reason for believing that there is such a person as God the fact that there are phenomena that elude the best efforts of current science. Rather, our knowledge of God comes by way of\u00a0general\u00a0<\/em>revelation, which involves something like Aquinas\u2019s general knowledge of God or Calvin\u2019s sensus divinitatis<\/em>, and also, and more importantly, by way of God\u2019s\u00a0special<\/em>\u00a0revelation, in the Scriptures and through the church, of his plan for dealing with our fall into sin. . . .<\/p>\n Serious Christians should indeed resolutely reject this way of thinking. The Christian community knows that God is constantly active in his creation, that natural laws, if there are any, are not independent of God, and that the existence of God is certainly not a hypothesis designed to explain what science cannot. Furthermore, the Christian community begins the scientific enterprise already believing in God; it does not (or at any rate need not) engage in it for apologetic reasons, either with respect to itself or with respect to non-Christians.\u00a0 (\u201cMethodological Naturalism\u201d<\/a>: Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith\u00a0<\/i>49<\/b>\u00a0[September 1997]: 143-154)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n *****<\/p>\n Photo credit:<\/strong> \u201cBig Bang\u201d image<\/span> [Max Pixel<\/a> \/\u00a0Creative Commons Zero \u2013 CC0<\/a>. license]<\/p>\n *****<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u201cAnthrotheist\u201d commented in the combox of my post,\u00a0Dialogue w Atheist on the Origin of the Universe. His words will be in blue. ***** I can\u2019t help but feel like there is still a \u201cGod of the gaps\u201d in effect here. Of course. I think it\u2019s because that is the stock response of lots of atheists, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2331,"featured_media":20417,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[124,112],"tags":[1243,1048,1197,1246,1199,1241,660,254,1244,5858,5861,662,4144,1240,1248,1245,1047,253,295,1247],"class_list":["post-20408","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-atheism-agnosticism","category-philosophy-science","tag-argument-from-contingency","tag-argument-from-design","tag-astronomy","tag-big-bang","tag-christianity-science","tag-cosmological-argument","tag-cosmology","tag-faith-and-reason","tag-first-cause","tag-god-science","tag-god-of-the-gaps","tag-intelligent-design","tag-irreducible-complexity","tag-multiverse","tag-physics","tag-prime-mover","tag-teleological-argument","tag-theistic-arguments","tag-theistic-evolution","tag-universe"],"yoast_head":"\n